Q 01/05

Which planet is the hottest in the solar system and spins backwards compared with most others?

A) Mercury

B) Venus

C) Mars

D) Jupiter

Answer · why

B) Venus

Venus is hotter than Mercury even though it sits nearly twice as far from the Sun, because its thick atmosphere traps the heat. Its surface averages a...

Q 02/05

Which city was built as Australia's capital after Sydney and Melbourne each fought to be chosen?

A) Perth

B) Brisbane

C) Canberra

D) Adelaide

Answer · why

C) Canberra

Canberra was a compromise between the two rivals, and the deal required the new capital to sit at least 100 miles from Sydney. Melbourne hosted the go...

Q 03/05

Which American author of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer took a pen name from a riverboat depth call?

A) Jack London

B) Herman Melville

C) Edgar Allan Poe

D) Mark Twain

Answer · why

D) Mark Twain

Mark Twain was the leadsman's cry for a river depth of two fathoms, safe water for a steamboat. Samuel Clemens learned it while working as a steamboat...

Q 04/05

Which Warsaw-born scientist is the only person with Nobel Prizes in two different sciences?

A) Marie Curie

B) Linus Pauling

C) Lise Meitner

D) Niels Bohr

Answer · why

A) Marie Curie

Marie Curie won in physics and then in chemistry, and named the element polonium after her homeland Poland while it was still partitioned among three ...

Q 05/05

Which river rises in Montana, crosses the Great Plains and joins the Mississippi near St. Louis?

A) Colorado

B) Missouri

C) Ohio

D) Arkansas

Answer · why

B) Missouri

The Missouri flows 2,341 miles from the Rocky Mountains, and joined to the lower Mississippi it forms the fourth-longest river system in the world.